Also referred to as the First mandala. A small wooden painting. The oldest of the Three Jōdo Mandalas *jōdo sanmandara 浄土三曼荼羅. It has the simplest composition of the three, for unlike the *Taima mandara 当麻曼荼羅 and *Seikai mandara 清海曼荼羅, it does not include scenes from the preface of Kanmuryōjukyō 観無量寿経 (Sutra on the Meditation on the Buddha of Infinite Life) in the left, right, and bottom courts (see *Kangyō hensō 観経変相).
Traditionally said to have been envisioned by the Sanron 三論 school monk Chikō 智光 (709-ca. 790) from Gangōji 元興寺. The miraculous story be hide the mandala, related in such texts as Yoshishige Yasutane's 慶滋保胤 Nihon ōjō gokurakuki 日本往生極楽記 (late 10th century) and Eikan's 永観 Ōjō shūin 往生拾因 is as follows: Chikō shared a room with a monk named Raikō 頼光 at Gangōji, where they practiced religious devotions. After Raikō died, Chikō prayed for his friend and learned that he had been reborn in *Amida's 阿弥陀 Western Paradise gokuraku jōdo 極楽浄土. Chikō longed for rebirth in Amida's Pure Land. Raikō appeared to him in a dream and told him he should practice inner visualization of Amida and his Pure Land; Amida himself showed him how by revealing to him a miniature Paradise in the palm of his hand. Upon awakening, Chikō had an artist paint what he had seen.
*Kakuzenshō 覚禅鈔, a collection of iconographical drawings by the Shingon 真言 monk Kakuzen 覚禅 (1143-1212) dating to around 1200, indicates the original mandala was a small painting about 30 cm (one shaku 尺) square. This was lost to fire in the Muromachi period. Two extant examples at Gokurakubō 極楽坊, Gangōji in Nara, are a large (182 ㎠) wooden panel painting (early Kamakura period) and small painting (30 ㎠) on silk in a miniature shrine *zushi 厨子 (early Muromachi period).